


too high and so unsure

by someticket



Category: Life Is Strange (Video Game)
Genre: F/F, Near Death Experiences, lets go baby
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-18
Updated: 2020-03-18
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:33:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23201008
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/someticket/pseuds/someticket
Summary: Chloe doesn't remember dying- until she does
Relationships: Maxine "Max" Caulfield/Chloe Price
Comments: 4
Kudos: 24





	too high and so unsure

"No one would even miss your punk ass, would they?" Nathan jeers, and Chloe wants to protest but can't remember 𝘸𝘩𝘺 , he's 𝘳𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵, and then there's blood all over her shirt and she's falling.

*****

Joyce stands in front of the stove, humming along to the radio. The windows are thrown open and Chloe can hear birds singing and can smell omelette and can taste cigarette smoke in her mouth.

"Mom," she cries, and throws her arm around Joyce. Her mom turns from the stove to hold Chloe against her chest. 

"What's this about, baby?" She asks, and tears threaten to spill out of Chloe's eyes.

"I'm so scared, Mom," she whispers, and her voice cracks. "I don't know what's happening."

"Oh Chloe," Joyce sighs. "You're so strong, but you can't back down to fear now." She pulls back and takes Chloe's head in her hands. "Help me make breakfast. I need bacon, will you grab it for me?"

Chloe says, "I think I'm dying."

Joyce hums and seasons the omelette.

Chloe says, "I think I've died before."

"Hurry up with the bacon, honey, or the eggs will burn."

"I don't want to die," Chloe says, and then she's on the beach.

The sun is setting and there's sand in her shoes and stuck to her skin, and Chloe has a distinct memory of wheeling herself down the ramp and staring out to sea.

"You're a disgrace," Frank says from where he's sitting on the sand. Chloe sits beside him.

"Why are you here?" She asks.

"Fuck if I know," Frank replies.

A breeze picks up. Chloe shivers. There's a dead whale a mile away, and it smells like salt and rot.

"Where's your mutt?" she asks.

Frank's lip lifts into a sneer. "You killed him." He spits into the sand. "You killed Jefferson and you killed that Prescott kid and you killed Rachel and you killed me, and you don't even has the decency to die."

"No," Chloe says. "I didn't kill anyone."

"Doesn't matter," Frank jeers. "You're dying now anyway."

"Max will save me," Chloe murmurs to herself. 

"Max is dead." Frank finally looks at her. There's blood pouring out of his eyes, his ears, his mouth. Chloe closes her eyes.

She opens them when she feels fingers running through her hair.

"Are you sure about green, Chlo?" Max asks, and Chloe lets out a sob.

"Too late now, I guess. I have the dye in." Max stands over her, with Rachel's flannel and that stupid camera slung over her shoulder.

"Why do I remember you?" Chloe asks. "You left years ago. Why do I know what you look like. Why do I know what your hand feels like in mine? Why do I know I gave you that camera." She's crying, crying and doesn't care, her tears slip onto the bathroom floor. "Why do I know what it's like to love you when I 𝘣𝘢𝘳𝘦𝘭𝘺 𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘸 𝘸𝘩𝘰 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘢𝘳𝘦?"

Max's hands still. "Time isn't a straight line, but it's not a circle either. Remember in kindergarten we drew a really long squiggly line and coloured in the white spaces?"

Chloe doesn't remember. She picks some mould off the tiles. They're green, and they're disgusting, and she doesn't know who's bathroom this is.

"That's what time is," Max continues. "It, um. It crosses over itself all the time."

"I don't remember dying," Chloe says. "Will I remember this?"

Max picks up the bottle of dye and reads it. "I think we should have bleached it first, Chlo."

Chloe wipes the tears from her eyes.

When she opens them she's standing in Blackwell Academy. It's been redecorated, but she recognises the hallway with the girls' bathroom. She was here an hour ago, a week ago, a lifetime ago.

David scowls at her. "What are you doing here? You shouldn't be here."

"I don't know!" Chloe yells. "I don't know! I don't fucking know! Why is this happening?"

"You're not welcome here, Chloe," Davis tells her, reaching for his belt.

"I'm not welcome in Arcadia Bay!" Chloe shoots back. "I'm not welcome in 𝘭𝘪𝘧𝘦, and I'm not even welcome in death, apparently."

"Get out," David says, grabs his torch and shines it in her eyes.

The ruins of Arcadia Bay stretch out below her. Chloe cries like her mother did when William died, folding in the middle like a fiver dollar note. A boy beside her hands her a tissue.

"I don't know who you are," she hiccups.

The boy smiles wryly and then turns to the wreckage. "Arcadia Bay has always been a ghost town."

"No," Chloe insists. "We stopped this. We fixed it."

The boy looks at her. He's missing an eye. "Daniel caused grief too, I think"

Chloe straightens up. She looks at Arcadia Bay. She looks at the skeleton of a town on a beach.

"I'm so tired," she says. "We fixed this. That was the whole point."

"Have you seen Daniel?" The boy asks. "I'm looking for him."

"Is this why I can't go home?" Chloe wonders aloud. "Is there just nothing there? After all that? After all our fucking work."

"I need to find Daniel," the boy repeats.

Chloe can't look at it anymore. She turns around-

Rachel Amber stands in front of her, beautiful and shining and swinging a set of car keys around her finger. "Are you ready?" she asks from the other side of the Two Whale's counter.

Chloe looks down. She's wearing a work apron. Her name tag says 'dead'.

Rachel leans forward on her elbows. "Don't tell me you're backing out now, babe. You've been working here for months to save up."

Chloe jumps over the counter in a swift movement. "Rachel," she sighs, and buries her face in the crook of her neck.

Rachel laughs and pulls back. "Come on," she says. "Your bag's in the car, if you're ready." She takes Chloe's hand and leads her outside. There's a beat down car in the parking lot and there's dead whales on the beach.

Chloe's holding the keys. "Where will it take me?" She asks.

Rachel shrugs. "Who cares? We'll be together."

Chloe looks at her. "You're dead, Rachel."

Rachel frowns. "I'm right here, Chlo. Are you feeling okay?"

"You're dead and I'm dying," Chloe says. She looks at the keys.

Rachel purses her lips. "It's your choice, Chloe. Leaving in that car will take all the pain away. Besides, you heard Nathan saying no one will miss you."

Max would.

"Don't even have the fucking decency to die," Frank growls, Pompidou bleeding out into the sand at his feet.

"Go home, Chloe," David says, gentler this time, glancing at the door to the Blackwell Academy girls' bathroom.

"You've been so brave, baby," Joyce tells her over the crackling radio on the windowsill. "You can keep going."

Max slides her fingers through Chloe's hair from where she sits on the edge of their bathtub. "I tried to hard to save you," she murmurs calmly. "Sometimes you just have to save yourself."

"Thanks, Chloe," Rachel says, and maybe its for being her friend last year or maybe or for finding her body next week or maybe its for not dying, right now.

Chloe turns and throws the keys as far as she can.

*****

In the girls bathroom at one of hundreds of crossings in time, Chloe opens her eyes.


End file.
